Database

1. Used for Online Transactional Processing (OLTP) but can be used for other purposes such as
Data Warehousing. This records the data from the user for history.
2. The tables and joins are complex since they are normalized (for RDMS). This is done to reduce
redundant data and to save storage space.
3. Entity Relational modeling techniques are used for RDMS database design.
4. Optimized for write operation.
5. Performance is low for analysis queries.
Data Warehouse
1. Used for Online Analytical Processing (OLAP). This reads the historical data for the Users for
business decisions.
2. The Tables and joins are simple since they are de-normalized. This is done to reduce the
response time for analytical queries.
3. Data Modeling techniques are used for the Data Warehouse design.
4. Optimized for read operations.
5. High performance for analytical queries.
6. Is usually a Database.
It's important to note as well that Data Warehouses could be sourced zero to many databases.

FEATURES

DATABASE

DATA
WAREHOUSE

Characteristic

It is based on Operational
Processing.

It is based on Informational
Processing.

Data

It mainly stores the Current data

which always guaranteed to be
up-to-date.

It usually stores the Historical

data whose accuracy is
maintained over time.

Function

It is used for day-to-day

operations.

It is used for long-term

informational requirements and
decision support.

User

The common users are clerk,

DBA, database professional.

The common users are knowledge

worker (e.g., manager, executive,
analyst)

Unit of work

Its work consists of short and

simple transaction.

The operations on it consists of

complex queries..

Focus

The focus is on Data IN

The focus is on Information OUT

Orientation

The orientation is on
Transaction.

The orientation is on Analysis.

DB design

The designing of database is ER

based and application-oriented.

The designing is done using

star/snowflake schema and its
subject-oriented.

Summarization

The data is primitive and highly

detailed.

The data is summarized and in

consolidated form.

View

The view of the data is flat

relational.

The view of the data is

multidimensional.

Access

The most frequent type of

access type is read/write.

It mostly use the read access for

the stored data.

Operations

The main operation is index/hash

on primary key.

For any operation it needs a lot of

scans.

Number of records accessed

A few tens of records.

A bunch of millions of records.

Number of users

In order of thousands.

In the order of hundreds only.

DB size

100 MB to GB.

100 GB to TB.

Priority

High performance, high

availability

High flexibility, end-user autonomy

Metric

To measure the efficiency,

transaction throughput is
measured.

To measure the efficiency, query

throughput and response time is
measured.

Based on these differences, we can say that the Database is suitable for the traditional type of data
storage technique in which the importance is given to the transactional processing, while theData
Warehouse is a modern form of data storage technique which is used for processing huge amount
of data to extract useful information from it.